Saint Joseph Catholic Church

Pope Leo XIV visited a prison in Bata, Equatorial Guinea, this evening and told the prisoners that “today, I am here to tell you something simple: no one is excluded from God’s love!” (video)

Vatican News, the news agency of the Vatican’s Dicastery for Communication, reported:

Among the 55 villages in southern Lebanon where the Israeli army is currently using excavators and bulldozers to demolish the last remaining public buildings, schools, and private homes—structures that had somehow survived the fierce bombardments of recent weeks—and which military commanders just yesterday declared off-limits to the residents who had fled to save their lives, there remain three villages that are still almost intact and inhabited.

Father Tony Elias, a Maronite priest who ministers in Rmeish, told Vatican News that “there is no way in or out. All the roads are blocked. We are struggling immensely to get water, baby formula, and diesel fuel delivered.”

Andrea Monda, the newspaper’s director, recalled that “he handed me this text—typewritten—dedicated to Virgil. I did not immediately realize it was a gift; I asked him if he wished for me to publish it in L’Osservatore Romano, but he demurred, saying, ‘It is merely a youthful trifle, something I wrote a long time ago.’”

“He went on to explain that, in his youth, he had been deeply intrigued by the widely held thesis of Virgil as a ‘pre-Christian’ poet and prophet; this text was born of that curiosity and passion,” Monda continued, adding:

Once his explanation was complete, he let me understand that he wanted me to keep it for myself. That gesture moved me—and still does, every time I think of it—but some time ago, as the date of the first anniversary of his death approached, I realized that April 21st is also the birthday of Rome, the city “founded” by Aeneas.

This coincidence prompted me to disobey him; yet I am convinced he would be pleased—as, too, will be the readers of this “party newspaper,” who will thus come to know another facet of the man who was Pope Francis.

“The emphasis on peace, on returning to negotiation, and on respect for international law—interventions that have drawn reactions in recent days—fits within this context,” Tornielli wrote. “It helps to clarify once more the nature of the Church’s service, and particularly that of the Successor of Peter, who does not act as a politician but as a pastor.”

“Yet it is inherent in being a pastor—far from any reduction to a purely spiritual or abstract dimension—to care about peace, justice, dialogue, encounter, the building of more just societies, closeness to those who are persecuted or discriminated against, solidarity with innocent victims of war, and the prophetic concern for the fate of humanity in this “dramatic hour of history,” Tornielli concluded.

Pope Leo XIV visited a psychiatric hospital in Equatorial Guinea (video) and said that loving care for the sick is a hallmark of Christian civilization.

“In harmony with his predecessors, he took up the legacy of the Second Vatican Council and spurred the Church to be open to mission,” Pope Leo continued. “We still hear his exhortations, expressed in eloquent words, to make the good news more understandable: mercy, peace, brotherhood, the smell of the sheep, the field hospital and many others. Each of these expressions brings us back to the Gospel he lived with a new language that proclaims the same Gospel as always.”

Pope Leo also highlighted his predecessor’s Marian devotion.

“Pope Francis nurtured a deep devotion to Mary throughout his life,” he said, citing his visits to the Papal Basilica of Saint Mary Major and Marian shrines around the world. “May the Virgin Mary, Mother of the Church, help us to be tireless apostles of her divine Son and prophets of his merciful love in every circumstance.”